The Archaeological Journal
NOTES FOR THE GUIDANCE OF CONTRIBUTORS
(Revised July 2007)		  
1. The Archaeological Journal is published annually, complete in one issue. Papers of any length may be submitted for consideration at any time. Prospective authors should be aware that papers published in The Archaeological Journal are subject to peer review. Papers submitted for consideration are read by external referees whose comments may remain confidential. 
2. Acceptance of a contribution implies the formal transfer of copyright in that contribution to the Royal Archaeological Institute, and authors may expect to sign a paper to this effect. The Institute will normally grant permission to authors, or their executors, for a contribution to be reprinted in whole or in part elsewhere after it has appeared in the Journal. 
3.In return for the assignation of copyright authors receive twenty-five offprints free of charge and may order any additional quantity at their own expense. Additional orders may be placed at proof stage. 
 TEXTS  
4.All copy (including quotations, appendices, lists, bibliographies and captions) must be printed with double spacing, on one side of the paper only, and allowing wide margins. The font size should be 12 point. All pages must be numbered. A single copy of the typescript should be submitted, but authors are recommended to retain a duplicate copy. Papers must be accompanied by a scheme indicating the divisions of the text and the relative importance of the various headings, sub headings, etc. The main text should be preceded by a summary of about one hundred words. The summary should not include references or refer to illustrations within the article itself. A copy on disk of the final draft of the text is required. 
5. Both line drawings and photographs will be numbered in a single sequence within each paper and should be given a number in the text, thus (Illus. 9). Photographs are integrated within the text and should not be numbered separately. Please note in the margins where you wish illustrations to be placed. 
6. The beginning of each paragraph, except for the first after a heading or subheading, must be indented one tab space. 
7.Short quotations should be enclosed in single quotation marks and run on with the main text. For quotation within a quotation, double quotation marks should be used. Lengthy quotations should be indented, beginning a fresh line, without quotation marks. 
8.Place names should be accompanied by their county or other ascription. Historic counties (pre-1974) should normally be used, but modern administrative areas should be given where appropriate. The names of persons still living should be preceded by the appropriate title when first mentioned. 
9.Words to be printed in italics should not be underlined in the typescript, but set in italics. This includes titles of books and periodicals, and technical terms or phrases in languages other than English. Foreign language quotations of more than a few words should not be set in italics, nor should the various headings and sub-headings in the text. 
10.The preferred spelling is that given in the Concise Oxford Dictionary (tenth edn, 1999). Authors should particularly note that the –ize form is preferred for verbs, e.g. criticize. 
11.The practice of the Concise Oxford Dictionary should be followed in the use of hyphens for compound nouns. Compound adjectives are usually hyphenated. Adjectives ending in -ly are not hyphenated. Note the difference between

in the tenth century    and
the tenth-century manuscript

 
12.The difference between contractions and abbreviations should be noted carefully. A contraction concludes with the final letter of the full word and is not given a full stop (St, Mr, Dr, vols, Illus [plural]). An abbreviation finishes with a different letter from the full word (pp., a.m., vol., Illus. [single], etc.). 
13.Radiocarbon dates should always be cited together with their laboratory reference number and should be presented in the following format using the calibration published in the journal Radiocarbon 40 (1998) and should state the probability level used. Earlier calibrations are not acceptable. Advice on recalibrating dates may be obtained from the laboratory which provided the dates. It is also good practice to indicate the material and context from which the sample was taken. In many cases it will be most appropriate to collect this information into a single table.

For date number Q 3047:
 the uncalibrated date is2945 ± 40 14C BP (Q-3047)
 the calibrated date is1250–1230 cal. BC (Q-3047) at the 68 per cent probability level.
 or1305–1280 cal. BC (Q-3047) at the 95 per cent probability level.

Please note the punctuation and capitalization used.

 
14.Historical dates should, where necessary, be preceded by AD (AD 43) or succeeded by BC (54 BC). The abbreviation AD may be omitted where there is no ambiguity. 
15.Dimensions should normally be given in metric units. Please note that the British Standard units are the metre and the millimetre. Where measurements have been taken to the nearest centimetre and a spurious claim to greater accuracy might be implied by expressing them in millimetres, they may be rendered as two decimal places of a metre, e.g. 0.35 m instead of 350 mm. In cases where measurements have been made in Imperial units or where the use of Imperial dimensions greatly facilitates comparison with previous literature, they may be used in the text, but metric equivalents should be given in brackets immediately following, e.g. 4 ft 61/2 in. by 1 ft 9 in. (1.38 x 0.53 m). In quotations from other authors using only Imperial units, metric equivalents should be inserted in square brackets, e.g. [1.38 x 0.53 m]. Please note the spacing and punctuation in these examples. See also the final sentence of paragraph 21. 
 REFERENCES  
16.Footnotes will not be admitted. Brief explanatory comment should be incorporated within the text; lengthier matter may form an appendix at the end of the paper. References to published and unpublished documents should be given in a bibliography (see paragraphs 17 to 18 below). 
17.Details of all material to which reference is made in the body of the text (including any tables, etc.) should be listed in a bibliography at the end. Where appropriate, the bibliography may be divided into sections dealing respectively with UNPUBLISHED DOCUMENTARY SOURCES, PUBLISHED DOCUMENTARY SOURCES or OTHER WORKS. Examples of bibliographies treated in this way may be found in volume 137 (1980), 275–79. 
18.DOCUMENTARY SOURCES should be given a coherent and readily comprehensible system of abbreviated references and should be listed in a logical alphabetical and/or numerical order. For unpublished documents there should be a brief description of the item and a statement of its location. 
 Examples  
(a)Unpublished 
 Leicestershire Record Office

Leics. R. O., 15D55/26aSpecification for new pewing and putting in new galleries to Appleby Church, undated

 
(b)Published 
 Rot. Hund. Rotuli Hundredorum tempore Henrici III et Edwardi I, edited by W. Illingworth and J. Caley. two vols, London: Record Commissioners, 1812–18.  
 SECONDARY WORKS should form a single list in alphabetical order of author's surnames or alternative short reference (see note i below). For the sake of clarity the examples given here are presented in three sections, but the bibliography at the end of a paper should not be so divided. Note carefully the use of upper and lower case in titles of books, journals and articles 
(a)Books 
 MacKie, E. W. 1974 Dun Mor Vaul: An Iron Age Broch on Tiree, Glasgow: University Press. 
 Neal, D. S. 1974 The Excavation of the Roman villa in Gadebridge Park, Hemel Hempstead, Research Report of the Society of Antiquaries, 31, London: Thames and Hudson. 
(b)Chapters, essays, etc., in contributory volumes 
 Jones, G.D.B. and Lewis, P. R. 1974 Mining and the environment, in P. A. Rahtz (ed.) Rescue Archaeology, 130–46, Harmondsworth: Penguin. 
(c)Articles in periodicals 
 Wells, C. 1974 Probable trephination of five early Saxon skulls, Antiquity, 48, 298–302. 
 Notes  
iIn cases where it is more informative to use other forms of abbreviated reference rather than the author's name (e.g. V.C.H. ), this may be done. If such references are frequent, it may be advisable to introduce a separate list of abbreviations.  
iiIf a work has three or more authors, it should be cited in the text under the name of the first author, followed by et al.  
iiiIf one volume only of a multi-volume work is cited, then the publication particulars of that volume alone are usually sufficient. The volume number, in Arabic numerals, should follow the title after a comma.  
ivIn the case of essays in contributory volumes and periodicals, the full pagination should be quoted in the bibliography.  
vContributors are asked to note especially the punctuation and the order of the items in the above examples.Publishers' names are required.  
viJournal titles should be abbreviated according to the principles laid down in British Standard 4148 Abbreviations of Title Words and Titles of Publications (1985); a list of abbreviations of periodical titles is included in Signposts for Archaeological Publication (London: Council for British Archaeology, 1976), which also gives advice on many practical matters concerning publication. Note the use by the Archaeological Journal of full stops after abbreviations for journal titles, contrary to CBA practice, but in conformity with BS 4148. Full stops are not used after contractions (see paragraph 12 above). 
19.References in the text should be in abbreviated form. Either the author's name should be part of the sentence structure, e.g.:
          
   Mackie (1974, 23) argues that . . .
          
or the whole reference should appear in brackets, preferably at the end of the sentence, e.g.:
          
   . . . has now been clearly demonstrated (Neal 1974, 104).
    . . . the font had been moved (Leics. RO 15D55 / 26a).
          
In the examples given, 23 and 104 are page numbers ('p.' and 'pp.' are not required); pl. . . . and fig. . . . may similarly follow the date of publication.		 
 ILLUSTRATIONS  
20.The responsibility for supplying all illustrations rests with the contributors. The Editor cannot undertake to obtain published photographs etc., on their behalf. Where questions of copyright are involved, contributors must obtain the necessary permission well in advance of publication.  
21.Illustrations only of the highest quality may be published. For photographs a glossy print is acceptable, although, where possible, they should be provided in digital format. Line illustrations should be submitted in digital format with a hard copy and not as drawings on film or other media; authors are advised to discuss appropriate format with the Editor in advance of final submission.  
22.Useful Information / Definitions. The description greyscale (or US grayscale), which is used by most graphic software is equivalent to halftone in printing terms, and applies to any monochrome image which contains shades of grey other than 100% solid black and pure white: e.g. a photograph.

The term line is used for images made up of areas, or lines, of solid black and white: e.g. a plan or an elevation. (Note that the inclusion of a simple patch of grey, however small, in such an image defines it greyscale.)

The print area of an Archaeological Journal page is 190 x 135 mm. Bearing in mind the fact that a caption will accompany it, the area available for an illustration is approximately 175 x 135 mm or 190 x 120 mm in the case of a ‘landscape’ page. This should be taken into account when preparing line drawings and when recommending reductions. Pull out illustrations should be avoided wherever possible. Where they appear unavoidable, the Editor should be consulted before final submission of the artwork. Ensure that scales (either metric or dual standard) and north points are included where required and that everything which appears on the drawing (trench numbers, room numbers, and so on) relates clearly and consistently to what is said in the text.

 
23.Captions for all the illustrations in an article should be presented together on a sheet or sheets of paper separate from the text and submitted as a separate file on disk. 
24.File Format. Please supply all images (whether line or greyscale) as TIFFs or highest-quality JPEGS. Most CAD, drawing, and photo-editing software permits saving (or ‘exporting’) in at least one of these file-types. Do not supply ‘native’ files of the software used (e.g. Autocad or Photoshop): unless the editor and printer happen to have the same version of the same software they will not be able to use them. 
25.Resolution. The Journal’s printer works with both greyscale and colour images at 350 dpi (dots per inch) at the size at which they are to appear in the journal. Line images must be at least 1000 dpi, also at their intended appearing size, in order not to reveal stepping (the appearance of being made up of blocks) on curves and diagonals.

To bring this about, images must be scanned, photographed, or computer-drawn at at least these resolutions.

As an image is enlarged or reduced its true resolution decreases or increases in simple inverse proportion to the change in its linear size. So if, for instance, a 60 mm-wide greyscale image is to be printed 120 mm wide at 350 dpi, it must be scanned or photographed at at least 700 dpi. (There is no benefit to be gained from taking a low-resolution image and specifying a higher resolution when saving it.)

The printer can reduce, but not increase, the resolution of images supplied. So always err on the large side when fixing file sizes.

 
26.Embedded Images. In no circumstances should images be supplied for publications embedded in text documents or other secondary files, such as PDF documents, word-processor files (e.g. Word), spreadsheets (e.g. Excel), Powerpoint presentations, databases (e.g. Access), or desktop-publisher files (e.g. PageMaker, Publisher, QuarkXpress). In all such cases the image pre-exists the final file in a graphic form and it is in that form, or a TIFF or JPEG derived directly from that form, that it should be submitted.

The printer may be able to extract an image from some of the above document types but there can be no certainty that the quality of the extracted image matches that of the original image file embedded.

 
27.Seeking advice. That an image looks acceptable on a computer screen, or prints satisfactorily on a laser or inkjet printer, does not guarantee that it will print well in the journal. If in doubt, send a sample image to the editor at as early a stage as possible. He will discuss it with the printer and let you know if any adjustment needs to be made. 
 TABLES  
28.Tables must be provided in a separate file from the main text. Authors should indicate their approximate position in pencil in the margin of the text. Tables should normally be submitted as a separate file and as a word document rather than in Excel or other formats.

Try to present tables in as simple a form as possible. The printer will impose the journal’s style on them. Consider whether the table proposed can be fitted into the journal’s page format without reducing the type to an illegibly small size. Always number tables however small and refer to them in the text by their numbers.

Position columns by using single tabs. Multiple spaces or combinations of tabs and spaces merely increases the work which must take place before the table can be set in type.

  
 PROOFS  
29.Typescripts should be very carefully checked before they are forwarded to the Editor. Alterations at proof stage are now so costly that the Editor will be able to permit them only in exceptional circumstances. He will not be unsympathetic towards alterations arising out of new research, although these may have to appear in the form of a postscript. The cost of any other alterations may have to be charged to the contributor. One set of proofs will be sent to contributors, but this is intended only to ensure the elimination of printer's errors.  
30.If proofs are not returned by the date requested, the issue may have to go to press without author's corrections.  
 PUBLICATION GRANTS  
31.It is expected that articles which result from archaeological or architectural recording which have been funded by developers as part of the development process will be supported by grants towards the publication costs.  
 FURTHER ADVICE  
32.For further advice on the preparation of typescripts and the correction of proofs, contributors are advised to consult the Modern Humanities Research Association Style Guide (2002) obtainable from the publisher, W. S. Maney & Son Ltd., Hudson Road, Leeds LS9 7DL. Contributors may also consult Signposts (see note vi to paragraph 17 above) and the literature there cited.  
   
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